Simi Valley filled up in the 70s and 80s with families chasing a yard and a safe street — many of them never left. Forty years of staying put built equity that can now retire the mortgage payment for good.
Simi Valley’s citywide average value of roughly $849,000 sits well under the 2026 FHA HECM limit of $1,249,125, which makes this one of Ventura County’s cleanest HECM markets: the program calculates against the home’s full value across nearly all of the city’s neighborhoods, from the original east-end tracts to Wood Ranch.
The tenure here is remarkable. I regularly meet Simi owners who bought for under $100,000 when the aerospace field lab on the hill was still running and the 118 was new — and who now hold three-quarters of a million dollars of equity alongside a fixed income that has to be stretched carefully. That is precisely the imbalance a reverse mortgage corrects: it converts a portion of the locked-up equity into eliminated payments, a growing credit line, or monthly draws, while you keep living in the same house on the same cul-de-sac.
Simi also has one of the stronger cases in the county for the eliminate-the-payment file: owners who refinanced during the cash-out years and carried the payment into retirement. When available proceeds cover the payoff, the required monthly payment ends at closing — and for a household running on Social Security plus a pension, that single change often rebalances the entire monthly budget.
Same broker, same phone number, three different instruments. I run the ones that apply to your home side by side — the numbers pick the winner, not the sales pitch.
Who qualifies: homeowners 62+ for the FHA HECM (55+ for many jumbo programs), living in the home as their primary residence, with sufficient equity and a financial assessment showing capacity to meet the obligations below. Independent counseling with a HUD-approved agency is required before a HECM — you choose the agency freely from the HUD roster (national line: 800-569-4287), and California adds its own consumer protections, including a cooling-off period.
What you must keep paying: property taxes (every line of the bill), homeowner’s insurance, reasonable home maintenance, and HOA dues where applicable. No monthly mortgage payment is required while you live in the home and meet these obligations — but failing to meet them can cause the loan to become due and payable. I structure set-asides when automating these payments is the safer plan.
What protects you: title stays in your name or your trust; the loan is non-recourse, so neither you nor your heirs can owe more than the home’s value; and heirs keep every dollar of remaining equity when the home is sold.
Four decades of Prop 13 protection means many Simi owners pay taxes on a small fraction of today’s value — a reverse mortgage doesn’t disturb that assessment. And for the owners eyeing a move closer to grandchildren elsewhere in California, Proposition 19 lets the low base travel with you; paired with a HECM for Purchase, the move needn’t create a payment.
Free-and-clear owners are often my best-fit clients — not because they must borrow, but because a standby line of credit costs little to hold, grows every year, and stands ready for the roof, the care need, or the market downturn. Opening it while you're younger and rates make the math favorable is what gives it time to grow.
No — both are non-means-tested, and reverse mortgage proceeds are borrowed funds, not income. Needs-based programs (SSI, Medi-Cal) can be affected by how proceeds are held from month to month, and if that applies to you we plan for it deliberately with your benefits counselor.
A defined, protected outcome: they inherit the home subject to the balance, can keep it by paying the balance off (on a HECM, capped at 95% of appraised value), or sell and keep the remaining equity. The loan is non-recourse. I encourage adult children to sit in on the process — it makes everyone’s life easier later.
Usually not. If the appraisal flags it, we handle it with a repair set-aside funded from the loan itself, or complete the work before closing. Don’t pre-spend savings on the assumption you must — call first and let’s sequence it correctly.
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Fifteen minutes on the phone and you’ll know what your home and age actually produce — HECM and jumbo, side by side, in writing. If it doesn’t serve you, I’ll be the first to say so.
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